The Ahmedabad crime branch officials foiled a robbery attempt and arrested five serial offenders in Ahmedabad on Friday. According to the police,the accused were members of an interstate gang who came to the city with a plan to rob a group of angadias (local courier company employees).

After receiving a tip-off about the arrival of the Mumbai-based gang in the city,the police arrested the five accused from near Kalupur post office. The arrested have been identified as Sureshkumar Pandian,Raju alias Suresh Pujari,Dinanath alias Dinesh Jayswal,Natu alias Nilesh Butani and Ranchod Patel. While Natu is a native of Rajkot and Ranchod is originally from Surat,Suresh,Raju and Dinaath are natives of UP,Karnataka and Tamil Nadu respectively.

Addressing mediapersons,Crime branch DCP Himanshu Shukla said,The gang had committed loots and dacoities in Ahmedabad. The gang members used to operate on a fixed modus operandi of attacking angadias who carry cash,valuables and jewellery for delivery outside the city and even Gujarat. The arrest prevented a dacoity that was planned by the gang.

The accused reportedly boarded the Chandigarh Express train from Mumbai and planned to wait at Kalupur railway station to attack on angadias who leave from Ratanpol and Maneck Chowk in the wee hours to deliver consignments outside Ahmedabad in train.

The police seized one pistol,four live cartridges,two knives,eight mobile phones and cash of Rs 75,000,amounting a total of Rs 1.14 lakh,from the accused. Police said that the cash recovered from the accused was stolen from a petrol pump employee in Junagadh on last month. In addition to that,they had stolen a Maruti WagonR car from Jetpur district in Rajkot to commit the loot on petrol pump employee,crime branch officials said.